Quiz Night

Quiz Nights are popular all over Britain. Here in Ulverston they seem to run on Tuesday evenings. We've been to Old Friends quiz night a couple of times now. You buy your own pint (or half-pint in my case). Someone comes around selling raffle tickets for a pound. (I think it's for a free meal.) Form up your team. The first time we went with another couple of Yanks: Team America. This time we took Andy, but were asked by a seasoned quizzer to join them. They had six or seven people, which is approaching unfair, and we had 3. She and a companion with "football knowledge" joined our team. Whoohoo! We had a chance now, with two English people on our team. Our new friends, Jean and Graham, were brilliant. He correctly matched all ten football teams (soccer to you) with their nicknames, and she knew nearly everything else. Our young lad, Andy, had a couple of answers about pop culture. Hal and I each contributed one or two correct answers.

Part One was a quiz sheet - match the ten teams with nicknames. Part Two questions were read by the quiz leader. Jean wrote out our answers. Twenty of those. Then we handed Parts One and Two into the leader for marking, whilst everyone tucked into the sandwiches and soup put out by the pub staff. Free food! And a very nice spread it was, but it was after 9 pm, and we had eaten supper, so we weren't inclined to eat much then. Our quizzes were returned, and rankings were announced. The other two times we've played, the scores had been all over the place. This time all scores were very close. I think there were eight teams, with anywhere from two to five members.

Part Three was another twenty questions. After those were graded, we were tied for second place, which meant a "sudden death" match. A single question, involving a date, was posted. Whichever team gave the leader the correct (or closest) written answer first, would win. So Jean had a single piece of paper, and sat verrrrry close to the announcer. "What year did Isabel Peron become president of Argentina?" Our guess was 1950. The other team's guess was 1960. The correct answer was 1974, so the other team won second place, and we won third. First prize was eight beer tokens (pints); second was four tokens; and third was a bottle of wine. Jean and Graham thought we should take the wine home; perhaps they knew it was "shite." We had great fun, and now have met some more English in their natural habitat.